by Michael Erskine
MANITOULIN—A work bee with an important mission takes place each Wednesday afternoon at the Little Current United Church (LCUC) hall as dozens of volunteers gather to turn milk bags into plastic mattresses for the homeless living on the streets of Sudbury. The Little Current crew is walking a path originally blazed by members of Trinity United Church in Mindemoya whose members are taking a short break.
“I was looking for a project for the church on the internet,” said Trinity United Church organizer Marian Sloss. “I got looking at stuff and saw what can be done with recycling milk bags. It developed from there.” What followed was years of gathering in milk bags from the congregation and weaving them into thick mattresses to help people living on the street off the cold ground, especially in winter.
The first mattress went out the door in 2016 and was followed by many more over the next several years. “My husband Alvin made the frames for us,” said Ms. Sloss.
It takes about 500 milk bags to create one of the mattresses, and that is a lot of collecting in the community, but the project got a tremendous boost from a familiar local company. “There was some kind of typo on the bags that Farquhar’s Dairy had ordered and they couldn’t use them,” explained Ms. Sloss, “so they donated them to us.” It was a truly silver lining, because when a business as large as the dairy orders milk bags, they come by the thousands in a case—2,400 to be exact—and the church received 38 boxes. That’s one big pile of bags.
“It’s nice to be able to get together to work on a project like this,” said Ms. Sloss. Unfortunately, the pandemic really threw a wrench into Mindemoya production, but it is starting to ramp up again.
Ray Landry, co-ordinator with The Homeless Network in Sudbury, said that the mattresses play a vital role in helping people living on the streets. “The mattresses are in high demand,” he said. “We generally only give them out to people who are not seeking shelter inside.” Some homeless, he noted, eschew the city’s shelters.
Street outreach workers like Brittany Laurie know where to look for those hard to help homeless, searching the wooded corners of the downtown where they tend to seek refuge. “The mattresses are very hardy,” she said. “The mattresses help keep people up off the cold ground, especially in winter,” she said. “We are always in need of them, that and adult clothing and shoes, especially men’s shoes sizes 10, 11 and 12, as well as men’s jeans size 32-38.” Ms. Laurie said such items can be dropped off at their offices at 307 Cedar Street in Sudbury between 3 and 4 pm. “It’s in a back alley,” she notes.
“We know most of the people who are out there, maybe not by name, but our outreach teams are able to identify them and have conversations with them on occasion if not regularly,” Mr. Landry said. “They find spaces within the city limits to pitch a tent or build a temporary shelter and make themselves as comfortable as possible in those conditions.”
“The reasons some people don’t seek shelter inside are complex,” said Mr. Landry. “It’s hard to paint any group with the same brush but generally we’re seeing persons who have a mistrust of institutions and the government and community services.”
“Some are frustrated with the lack of mobility in terms of gaining services and gaining housing,” Mr. Landry continued. “Some are just abjectly poor and can’t afford housing in their present state without making efforts to reconnect to financial opportunities and, as with many persons who are chronically homeless or living outdoors, there are other human factors such as the condition of their mental health and/or whether they use substances or not.”
The mattresses are about two inches thick and quite hefty, providing significant insulation from the cold ground. The LCUC volunteers are also making pillows to go with the mattresses, crafting them out of spare fabric stuffed with those same plastic bags.
“We will take as many as we can get,” said Mr. Landry of the mattresses, pillows and clothing. “The need always seems to be greater than the supply.”
